The marketplace is soon turning into a marketplace where developers just don’t care anymore. As for one example, a developer releases (a very controversial developer) an aircraft with no cockpit, only an exterior. When did MSFS get so low in standards? I didn’t know MSFS was a mobile game banking on microtransactions.
9/10 people will buy an aircraft like that cockpit’less aircraft without even reading the description box, sadly 9/10 of these people are on Xbox because they have lack of aircraft to choose from. But this shouldn’t be an excuse for developers to push out abandonware or shovelware.
Suggestions Asobo should take into account:
Asobo should set in a new Marketplace ToS.
We should have the ability to report any add-ons that go against ToS guidelines.
‘Version History’ doesn’t get used that often from developers. We need a better way to view when a product updated. If I go to a product page, I should see when they’re latest build got published. Put this information in Version History.
If an add-on has less than 2.0 stars, a pop up should stay on screen giving the reader the attention to read the description or look at the reviews before buying.
Add-ons who have 2.0 stars should be hidden from the main directory. They shouldn’t be allowed to be featured in the Top Selling or Trending sections.
How do you prevent people from playing the system and causing competing addons to fall off the marketplace, or have that pop-up warning? Additionally, what if the addon is something that only has an exterior view but is in fact a top seller and perhaps has a low rating simply because people don’t take the time to rate it?
It would take a lot of effort to prevent people from 1) playing the system to downvote or report violations of competitors or devs they don’t like for any reason, and 2) it would then in turn require defining what is “good enough” for the marketplace. There are those here and elsewhere who feel that anything that isn’t a 100% systems sim is garbage and not worth anyones time, and others who simply want to press one button and fly using the external camera.
These are just some very initial thoughts, but in summary I think it introduces a slippery slope in terms of perfectly acceptable addons for perhaps 80% of the community being removed or disrupted because of the super strict crowd not liking one or more aspects of it, or a dev with a similar product not wanting competition. The latter case would hopefully be rare but competition
is a thing in this community (see also: announcing 5+ years ahead of release that you are or will be making a product so that other companies don’t make that same thing).
The simming audience is growing and changing, and what is acceptable or not (especially in the Xbox environment) isn’t what many long time simmers may be used to.
Honestly, you think 90% of buyers of a particular add-on are not reading the description before purchasing? And you think they’re mostly (was 90% of 90% - so 81% your estimate, here?) on Xbox? I’d wager my entire house that you’ve misjudged those metrics. These poor quality add-ons often get purchased and ripped apart by the PC community way before they land on the marketplace.
Gaming is an industry that’s highly scrutinised by the consumer, everyone wants to see reviews, watch footage, realise value for money and for advertising/marketing to be held to account. The majority will surely be reading the words before buying add-ons unless it’s super straight forward and obvious what you’re receiving for your money.
I’m also a firm believer that if you aren’t willing to read the description before you buy something then you’re probably not going to be too concerned if it turns out to be a dud, either.
There also needs to be a standardized way to handle the problem of addons breaking from updates and the devs not fixing them. I think devs should be given ample time to update their addons, but if they don’t, there should be an option for a refund and the addon should be temporarily removed from the marketplace. If the refund is in the form of marketplace credit, then neither the dev or the customer is being punished for something they’re not responsible for.
With the Marketplace being the main source of MSFS income for MS (!!) I don’t expect ANY sort of quality control ever. As long as the purchase is as simple and fast as possible and as long as cash flows they will certainly not do anything that will make you think twice about a purchase only once. We’re talking MS here… It’s absolutely and only on the customers. If the marketplace is bad, don’t use it. If it pays out nothing will ever change. And if they think they need to improve the cash flow they’ll rather implement quick purchases and notifications into the game (see the world map) than improve the MP itself in favour of the customers.
I personally just don’t go there. Unfortunately this means I will miss out aircraft like the Hondajet but be it. There are others.
Like many others, I was so excited when Microsoft announced their intention to add an in-sim feature that would allow me to browse for, purchase and update my favourite addons without needing a dozen different installers and accounts.
Unfortunately, the implementation was and still is so diabolically bad it makes the “Windows Store” look amazing by comparison. I was a moderator on these forums during Beta, and for around five months after launch iirc. I spent so much time advocating for improvements to the marketplace, including passing on personal feedback directly to the Community managers who took the feedback to their internal teams; however, very little if any progress has been made. I can’t say I’m surprised, there has been very little emphasis on customer support, or experience - it was part of what drove me away from the simulator and a major factor behind why I decided to stop volunteering for several hours a week to help run these forums.
My issues with the marketplace are as follows:
They still provide no proof of purchase. This means if anything ever got deleted from your account you have no way to prove to Microsoft that you own a product.
- Yes we had at least one customer who made this complaint. I can’t say whether or not it happened, but let’s be honest this sim has been incredibly buggy at times so it wouldn’t surprise me, and his inability to show proof of purchase (because Microsoft refused to give him one) means he can’t actually prove it
By the way, if you have made any purchases through the marketplace, I highly encourage you to contact https://flightsimulator.zendesk.com - to ask for an itemised list of products that you’ve purchased and when. That way if you ever run into an issue like this you have SOMETHING to show them.
- I also question the legality of Microsoft not providing receipts, I’m sure it violates consumer protections in certain countries.
Updates take FOREVER. It does seem like they’ve made some progress on this, but I should not have to wait weeks or months to download an update for a product that was broken by an update, that the developer has submitted an update for - especially when Microsoft is still allowing people to purchase the product
The product review system is meaningless. A straight-star review system has never been beneficial. If you want to rate a product you should have to provide some sort of written review to go along with the rating, that way prospective customers can better determine whether it’s a product they want. - Bonus points for developers being able to reply like they can on the Google Play Store. This is a really good way for a developer to show they care, and for them to invite a potentially disgruntled customer to get in touch for better support/feedback opportunities
We SHOULD be able to report dodgy products. I know OP tried to be very diplomatic, but ■■■■ that ■■■■, I won’t… Captian Sim has released some very borderline products which they’ve tried to market as semi-decent products only to be extremely half baked. - One of their earlier ones I went as far as to complain that they were falsly advertising their product - hey look that’s another one of those pesky consumer protection laws…
Yes Microsoft having to review products that get flagged adds some additional workload on their team but a) I’m fairly sure Microsoft can afford to hire an additional developer and b) they’re running a store they should put in marginal effort
These reasons are why I’ve stopped buying products from the Marketplace, it is why Microsoft misses out on my percentage cut of every product I’ve purchased. - My condolences to the Xbox crowd who don’t have that option.